Park Avenue Tunnel, Unitarian Church of the Messiah, 34th Street

The old tunnel and the Unitarian Church of the Messiah, Park Avenue and East 34th Street, in Murray Hill, before 1890. Railroad extended north to 42nd Street. At the time, Forth Avenue ended at 34th Street. The residence on the left is on part of the site of the Hotel Vanderbilt, completed in 1913. Passenger visible boarding a Central Park train with the destination "Harlem via Madison Av." Source: Photographic views of New York City, 1870's-1970's, from the collections of the New York Public Library.

The urban development of Murray Hill is linked to the New York & Harlem Railway and that company' s owners, the Vanderbilt family. Horse-drawn cars began running along 14th Avenue from 14th Street to the Harlem River in the early 1830s and were replaced by steam locomotives before 1840. In the 1860s "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt took control of the railroad and then consolidated it with his extensive network of railroad companies which converged on his Grand Central Depot, completed in 1871 at East 42nd Street. By the late 1870s, Murray Hill had become an enclave of upper-middle-class rowhouses, private stables and churches all in keeping with Murray's restrictions.